Why? Oh, well - I thought you'd be rather an attractive person to marry. That's all. I mean, I sort of took a fancy to you. I can't tell you why. There's no rule about it, you know.

Never think that wars are irrational catastrophes: they happen when wrong ways of thinking and living bring about intolerable situations ... the root causes of conflict are usually to be found in some wrong way of life in which all parties have acquiesced, and for which everybody must, to some extent, bear the blame.

the autobiography is at one and the same time a single element in the series of the writer's created works and an interpretation of the whole series.

But you see, I can believe a thing without understanding it. It's all a matter of training.

Very dangerous things, theories.

I can't think why fancy religions should have such a ghastly effect on one's grammar. It's a kind of intellectual rot that sets in, I'm afraid.

Wherever you find a great man, you will find a great mother or a great wife standing behind him -- or so they used to say. It would be interesting to know how many great women have had great fathers and husbands behind them.